Repercussions of Rape (Part II)

It is truly amazing to me the response I have gotten from people based on my post Repercussions of Rape (Part I).  So many people have spoken of how courageous I am and how much help it is for people who have experienced sexual assault to read it and know they're not alone.

I am truly humbled by that. Please know that I appreciate the kind notes, Facebook messages, texts, love, and support.

The truth of the matter is, I honestly thought I was over the rape.  I really did.  Like, I didn't think about it, didn't talk about it, only occasionally had nightmares about it.  I even got told by a counselor (originally he was a marriage counselor, but the third time my ex-husband showed up late to the appointment, we realized that marriage counseling was a waste of time but he would happily continue to see me as I felt I had some unresolved issues beyond being emotionally, mentally, and physically tortured by my ex) after spilling the whole rape story that I had great coping mechanisms and there was no real need for me to go back.  He was happy to have me come back if I needed it, insurance would cover it, but there was no real need.

I had no idea that it was consuming my life.

My rape was characterized by someone overpowering me, speaking down to me, telling me I was  nothing, and the guilt associated with my best friend thinking I was sleeping with some other guy in his house when he and I'd had awkward, random, drunken casual sex a few weeks before.

When I encountered a bully, and there are many adult bullies that prey on people they scent weakness in, I would get sweaty, nauseous, clumsy, and my heart would start racing.  I never knew why I had such a visceral response to assholes.

It certainly couldn't be about the rape, right?  A therapist had told me I had great coping mechanisms and a solid support system, that I was just fine.

I do not want to get into specifics here, but just imagine that a person is in a position of power over you in your professional life.  Imagine even further that this person is a bully, a cruel person known for talking about his colleagues (bosses, lateral equals, and peons like me) behind their backs, of laughing at the misfortunes of others, of speaking down to people until they couldn't stand up any longer, telling people they were wrong when this person had no idea what h/she was talking about, and pouring on the guilt by emphasizing how your shortcomings (the ones that s/he had given you) explained why you did a crappy job.

If you had survived my situation, one would think that being bullied by some pathetic loser who epitomizes the Peter Principle would be nothing ... but it wasn't.

So I messed up.  A lot.  It took me forever to do anything at work because I was so anxious, and then it reached a point where it was coming home.

Being beaten down at work every day turned me from a fairly confident woman with many and varied passions (reading, writing, the beach, traveling, spending time with friends) to one who internalized everything.  The dog knocked something off the table?  My fault.  My daughter broke her leg and had to be in a cast because she was screwing around at Hannaford?  My fault.  The washing machine broke? Yup, my fault.

At first these were just feelings, and I tried to keep them from my husband and kids.  After Gabrielle was born, though, it came out in words.  This hypothetical a-hole boss honed the keen blade of self-loathing that went back to 1998, and with the stress of Gabrielle's bloody birth, which was sort of a nightmare, I came to a point where the rape, and its repercussions, nearly killed me.

After the rape, when I washed my hands, there was blood in the sink.  I saw blood in the sink when I washed my hands a month or so ago (and, I mean, I'm an English teacher ... I felt like freaking Lady MacBeth).  I am afraid to take showers, because the shower I took following the rape was when I started to come back to myself, and I was alone and so damn scared.  I will wake up screaming, or I'll jerk awake.  According to my husband, I say the things I said to my rapist when I am asleep, sometimes in a mumble but sometimes nearly yelling.

I am not healed now.  I am in counseling, and I suspect I will be for a long time.  My husband is extremely supportive (except when he's in a bad mood, which is almost never).  I've found some online support groups and even some groups that meet face to face, but the humiliation of someone knowing about the rape makes that medium hard for me.

I guess that makes me posting about it ironic, but the thing is that I am a teacher.  I have had more than one student tell me they were sexually assaulted.  I have heard stories that make my own experience seem very small.

I guess the bottom line is, sexual assault, molestation, rape, whatever word you want to use, they are more common than you might think.  If you are reading this and you feel alone, please know that you are not.

If you are reading this and you are one of my many wonderful friends whom I've blown off, I suspect I've put enough info here for you to figure out why.    

There is a picture that circulates around Facebook from time to time, and I guess that's what I want to end with.

Repercussions of Rape (Part I)

One night in early January of 1998, I got very drunk and had sex with my best friend.  I, of course, wanted to talk about it, even asked, "So that happened because we were so drunk, right?" because then of course we could laugh it off and move on and so on.  He said, "Being drunk had nothing to do with it."

Our friendship was a bit awkward after that, to say the least.

A couple of weeks later, we were out with a couple of his friends.  I was on my second drink at the bar (and that was when I could hold my liquor pretty well for a college girl), and suddenly I was cuckoo, like falling over my feet wasted.  It got worse instead of better, and I vaguely remember walking back to my best friend's condo.  He went upstairs with one of the other guys, and I went out to the balcony to smoke a cigarette with this guy, Tom.  I went to the bathroom, and when I came back, he gave me another beer.

**Note: I am putting in some details.  If this will bother you, please don't read it**
The next thing I remember, I was being sodomized on the pullout couch.  Words cannot express how painful it was.  When I went to cry out, I realized that my mouth felt like it had been propped open for hours.

"Stop!"I tried to yell, but it came out a whisper.  He did stop what he was doing, though.

"You shut up, bitch, or I'll kill you.  You and your little loverboy upstairs."

"He's not my--" I began, and he interrupted me by ... well, by filling up my mouth again.  I quickly realized why my mouth was so sore.

I was crying so hard, but I did it silently.

He said, "You're getting snot on my dick.  You'd better stop or I'll make you lick it off."

I guess he had an aversion to mucous, because he got on top of me and started raping me vaginally.  He had obviously spent some time doing this already.  The sheets of the pull-out couch were white, and I'd slept platonically on them with my best friend many, many times.  They were spotted with blood, I realized, and then I looked around and it occurred to me that "spotted" was a weak word.  This had clearly been going on a long time.

I begged him to stop over and over and he said, "You're really boring."

Finally, I said, "I want you to come.  I want to make you feel good."

He stopped what he was doing (briefly), got in my face, and said, "You don't have the stuff to make me come, little girl. You just don't have it."

Then I kind of blacked out again, which I'm glad about, and the next thing I know, someone is coming down the stairs.  It was, of course, my best friend, the one which I'd had drunken casual sex with just a couple weeks before.

I was so sore and doped up and naked and bloody and ashamed that I just said, "I'm going to go home, I think."

He didn't say anything.

I grabbed my clothes and ran for the bathroom.  I couldn't pee, even though I had to go terribly.  I sat there trying to make pee come out, but no luck.  When I stood to get dressed, I cried with pain and got very scared when I saw all the blood in the toilet bowl.

I flushed and went to the sink.  My hands were spotted with blood like a henna tattoo, and I used soap for what felt like forever, but even after that I don't know if the blood was gone or not.  I was still seeing it.

I walked out the door without saying goodbye and went home.  I locked the door and took a bath and looked at the bruises and felt the blood still seeping out of every orifice.  My jaw ached terribly and popped every time I went to open my mouth.  He had bitten off a piece of my nipple, and that hit me hard. I had fed my daughter with that nipple.

I laid in the bathtub until the water got cold, then I reran another tubful.  My vagina and anus were still bleeding, and I was afraid to look.  I fell asleep in the bathtub, and when I woke up I felt alive and myself, at least.

I got dressed in sweats and a t-shirt and made a grilled cheese sandwich.  I cleaned my apartment, even though it hurt terribly.  My best friend stopped by later, and I was going to tell him until I saw his face.  He had a bag with him, and he wouldn't look at me, just handed me the bag.

"The sheets," he said.  "There's blood all over them.  You ruined the sheets, but it's your blood, so maybe you won't mind how dirty they are" or something like that, and then he left.

"I had my period," I yelled after him.  "I just had my period, that's what the blood is."

He didn't listen.  He knew damn well I was lying.  He just didn't know why.

And life went on.  I put on a huge amount of weight and cut my hair short because I didn't want anyone to think of me as pretty.  I became sexually promiscuous with some pretty shady characters.  I basically gave Emily to my parents for awhile because I was such a mess.  I flunked out of college.

The woman is this picture (circa 2009) thinks the rape is behind her.  She has no idea that, even though her life is "together" on the surface, that ugliness is still inside ... and might always be there.

My parents knew that something had happened, but they didn't know what, and I certainly couldn't tell them.   They made a deal where they would pay for me to take a summer course at UNH and, if I did well, they would pay for me to go part-time in the fall, and, if that was successful, return to being a full-time student in the spring.

I had some successes in college, and that built up a bit of the confidence.  I met and married my ex-husband.  I became a teacher.  Life went on.

Until I bumped into my best friend at Wal-Mart one day in 2009 and asked if we could get a drink, that I had some things I needed to talk to him about.  That whole saga is recorded here, if you're interested in reading it.

I figured that my best friend knowing the truth would be an absolution of some sort, because I knew I had hurt him badly, and it was.

I truly believed that the rape was in the past, that I had healed, that I was over it.

This is all I can write for right now.  I'm starting to get upset and anxious, but I'll write "Repercussions of Rape Part II" in the next few days.

I will say this, to anyone who has ever been raped or molested or anything like that ... please, please, please know that it's not your fault, and know that there are people who will listen.  Sometimes it just takes awhile to be able to say the words ...